May 12, 2008

Fear And Thinking

Gratitude: That I’m home and doing laundry till noon today. And yes too, for that wabbit who gives me smiles. He’s looking at me right now. Yes, too, I’ll take pictures of him this morning.

Useful: Still rounding up links and suggestions to back up my plea to move on with the low water landscaping. I’ll talk with G about this tonight and get it in the mail to the management company this week.

Because I work, sometimes I seem to see the world as existing only in tiny bites. A decision made here may not have a reaction until weeks later…at least not one you can see. Sometimes life is only sound bytes. Other times it seems as if life is reduced to bullets while you work.

The fan on my computer has been totally silent since we bought it. Yes, it the computer has a Pentium 4. Yes, Pentium 4’s overheat. No, it wasn’t the fan on my computer that was overworking, the fan was working just right, it was the Pentium 4 chip that was beginning its long slide into burning out. We can stop this slide by buying a fan that blows cool air directly on the chip…..as we do in our laptop. Ah, this is a reality we know well as we have been through this before.

G bought and installed the new Photoshop Elements 6.0 on his computer first over the downloaded version. Once it was installed, G discovered that Photoshop Elements 6.0 can only be installed on one computer. One. If you want to put it on a second computer, you need to uninstall, turn in your codes, and get it off the first computer to move it to the second computer. We have a network of four. I won’t tell you how pissed we are that the usual unimpeded three uses aren’t allowed. Even Microsoft allows three uses. That’s an exceedingly expensive lack of communication which becomes apparent only when one very carefully reads the long pages of tiny grey print and checks that they approved the licensing. We don’t approve.

Everyone at work is anticipating the next homestand. We are all having great troubles thinking positively. We work Monday through Sunday, have the next Monday off, then again Tuesday through Thursday at work again. This is truly beyond awful for those who stand all six or seven hours. This is horrific if you are over fifty and parts of parts are wearing out. Many of the GSR’s are in their eighties.

I have cheated. I know from experience that it takes me three days to recover from five days of standing. Knowing that I am in trouble to begin with and wanting to halt my long slide into depression and negative thinking about this, I’ve taken a day off in the middle. Did I say I was going to a ball game that day? At least I can sleep in from the night game and will be sitting and with G….which is very important.

Work: Last homestand, the powers that be decided that anyone working in any Supervisory position must fill out a Supervisor Report. Ok. Shall I mention how many times I saw Sophie yesterday? Did you know Bailey and Maya came to call. They are the only dogs I received a Christmas Card from….or was it from their dear owners. I have that card right over my desk today.

They don’t want to know that. Instead I will keep on sending in papers that have nothing on them. Nothing happens. 3000 kids exiting my gates don’t count.

This homestand I got a wand. It’s one of those long electronic sticks that a security guard waves over your bag. It goes beep when it encounters metal. I received training, and when I got to my gate, I practiced on amenable Guest Service Reps, (GSR’s). Yes, some of the GSR’s took this personally tho I used it only as suggested on the really, really humongously big bags. On the only giantly overstuffed bags, I now have the workers take the top few layers out. They feel less offended, and I can see all the stuff at the bottom.

Grandkids: Ran into D and M’s mom. Wonderful to see her. Wonderful to catch up on all the family news from that branch. M has irritable bowel. I am so very sorry. A teenager with IBS is a terrible thing. I was one once. D is great…..a junior in HS and doing an computer internship downtown with an insurance company. He’s eying Berkley for college. One of his grandpa’s lives there, and that would be a great fit. D showed his mom how to get my blog via email, and she can read it easily now. I’m so pleased we are finding ways to stay in contact.

Tomorrow we are invited to Mohave’s school open house. We are jazzed to go, but we know that often she doesn’t tell her mom that these things are happening. Her teachers say she is brilliant. We know this, but we worry that she has inherited the alcoholic gene along with her brilliance.